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The First Robotic Musician
eldavojohn writes, "A new robot named Haile (pronounced hi-lee), which 'listens' to what musicians are playing and play along with them, has been developed at the [corrected] Georgia Institute of Technology. There are some videos at the GATech site. From the article: "If the musicians change the beat or rhythm, Haile is right there with them. 'With Haile there are two levels of musical knowledge... The basic level is to teach it to learn to identify music, to imitate,' Weinberg said. 'The higher level is stability of rhythm, to be able to distinguish between similar rhythms. In essence, Haile has the ability to recognize if a rhythm is more chaotic or stable, and can adjust its playing accordingly.' I don't know about the rest of Slashdot, but I can't wait for the day when I have my very own Robo Puente to play along with."
This is old news.
See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clay_Aiken
..before computer generated music becomes better than anything that could possibly be created by a person?
We'll know robots are truly evolved when they build their own museum :)
What did you eat today? http://www.atetoday.com/
I smell protests from the drummer and bass guitar unions. First the industrial revolution replaced workers with robots, now the entertainment industry is being targetted.
Wait, if the robotic drummer/bass guitar player invents a new riff, who takes the royalties? Maybe it could use the money for new servo motors or a replacement oil pan.
Task Mangler
I think we had one of those when I was a kid, though it was usually out of tune and you had to feed it Kibbles 'n Bits.
It's a percussionist, most of them are pretty robotic anyway.
after the lead singer thought he was a fish and the drummer went of to live on an island with a rock as a friend.
This space for rent
Can they show up to practice drunk and/or stoned? Do their girlfriends get jealous of the other musicians' girlfriends and start drama for no reason? Do they forget spare strings at the gig and have to borrow a bass from the other band? Do they need a place to crash one night and you come to find three months later that they still haven't left?
They can't be REAL musician robots until those conditions can be fulfilled.
"Crazy whatr they can do now...."
Let's all welcome Haile's first post on Slashdot!
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
So who is the RIAA going to sue? They have to sue someone. After all, that's all they do nowdays since the equalization of the vinyl records is no longer as profitable as extortion. (and because there aren't as many gold records to award as in previous years).
Any time a robot plays something, it is going to sound like something that the RIAA holds 'rights' to. So the robot is 'infringing' on 'their' copyrights. But, uh, sueing a robot is hard. They don't respond to threats. They ignore injunctions. Robots don't give a shit about human law, man, they just wanna rock'n'roll.
So are they going after the programmer?
"Your Honor, Let it be known that after 2.345 hours of playing a 130 beats per minute tempo, in the key of G#, if the human misses the beat by 0.256 seconds, the robot under inditment will consistently and 'knowingly' play the first three notes of "Free Bird". This is a willfull violation of copyright. We want $100,000,000,000.00; payable in monthly installments."
But the great thing about robots is no only can they now play music, but, with a little tweaking, they can also tear the fingers and toes off of entertainment lawyers. Accidently, of course, but AI routines can get a little unpredictable when clogged with human legal chaos. Shit happens.
Personally, when I want to play along with a machine I use a Zoom 900x series guitar effects DSP with the early 1970's Rolling Stones fed into the analog mix channel. Mix your guitar with lots of reverb, overdrive, a touch of delay, and a dollop of attitude.
When you get a robot to do what Keith Richards does, let me know.
We're charging our battery And now we're full of energy We are the robots We are the robots ....
We're functioning automatic
And we are dancing mechanic
We are the robots
We are the robots ....
a glorified metronome that can't keep time... just like our current drummer...
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
2. he doesn't show up an hour late for practice, completely drunk.
3. he doesn't ask stupid questions when the rest of the band gets into strategy and show planning.
4. he won't eat all th efood i nthe fridge at the band house.
5. he won't choke to death on someone else's vomit.
But if he is using Sony batteries, he might spontaneously combust...
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.